long lost

i've been remembering a lot lately. i lean my head against the mini-van window and recall how it felt to say goodbye to susie, gail and fil seven years ago in port blair. how we had all taken the dusk ferry from havelock and found a completely grungy room with extra spiders and two beds and somehow got comfortable. how when i woke up i had to grab my pack and say goodbye to them, feeling like i'd never see the tropical jungle again. like i'd never eat another ball of peanut toffee. never wake up to susie guffawing as a litter of puppies power-licked her face. i felt like i was being cauterized.

i've seen gail again since then, in australia where she lived with a painfully single woman who collected fairy sculptures and who went pram shopping just in case. i've seen susie twice since then. once in vancouver after she and her beau patrick finished busking across alaska and once last night.

we got off the bus here in pai and declared ourselves done with buses. from now on, it's the jetsetter's life for us. not so rough as plane fares cost about $25 around here and everywhere is looking more and more the same anyway. you want a bagel and cappucino? you want good cell reception? you want george clooney? don't sweat. it's all right there. or right there. or right here. it's all everywhere.

so i remember with minor trembling the places where those things weren't. the places that made me detox and do without.

i remember when i met susie and gail.

i remember the smoke pouring into the windows as the zanzibaris burnt coral for lime. the man who falls to the road in front of our car as his neighbors look on. is he hurt? is he dangerous? the sun is so high and the road so black. we are so far away as we watch afraid and ashamed in the rear view mirror. will he get up? will they help him?

i remember cursing at the boatman, tacking slow up the nile as he tries to extract another handful of pounds from us. rob almost pushes him in as we supply a chours of supportive cursing. it is a shame that we haven't the correct change and have to give the scoundrel what he wants anyway.

i remember the wind off the canal in dubai and the calls of the gold hawkers. i remember dawn in nairobi and the cup of tea in the sweaty cafe, full of green light. i can feel the soles of my feet burn as i quick step up the flagstones to see the buddha of polanawura. i can sit on our porch watching the river course through pai and remember.

i was here seven years ago. everything has changed including me.